Well, Lord, in any language, the cross spells out a denial of self. We want to learn how to be faithful to You, and we know that all of this can only happen for those disciples who really love You.
There is something about Jesus that caught the attention and attracted these men from various different fields of life. And the more the price was paid, the more they discovered Jesus; the more they loved Him, and the more their life was fulfilled.
Give us that same notion as we are beginning in these days to follow Jesus more deeply into His purpose for us. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
Thank you for the use of these various guitars. It’s very interesting.
All right. You notice—I don’t know—have you noticed something spooky? You know what’s really freaking me out? That copper girl keeps moving. I don’t know. Is she alive or what? I swear, she was standing by the water cooler, but the paper inside wasn’t wet. I don’t get it.
Anyway—wow. Anyway, you guys haven’t spooked me out, just the copper girl.
The mystery of the cross continues to work throughout our lives. Now listen, we’ve all talked about this, but I hope that you, as you’re here, have initially come to the cross and acknowledged all that Jesus has done for you—that He died for you to forgive your sins.
And maybe in one of your groups, back in the dorms, here in the workshops, or even in discussions, you’ve made a decision: you want to follow the Lord. You want to take up the cross. Praise God for that.
I met one brother this afternoon who has, during this time, decided to be baptized. That’s wonderful. Praise God, as a witness, as we’ve said.
Every time we gather like this, and every time you act respectfully, you’re denying yourself, because you’re actually a bunch of rebellious, pandemonium people. Every time you deny yourself and offer God praise, and push past your own timidity and all these things, you see God is pleased.
Every time we deny ourselves in order to worship and serve God, He is pleased. Even when He has to take us through the mill, as it were, He’s really pleased. He loves His disciples. He loved Peter. He loves them all. And He loves you too.
But we see that this is a mystery, right? Brothers and sisters, it’s amazing to me that there are many Christians who don’t understand the subjective work of the cross we’ve been talking about all this time.
They actually expect that any kind of bad thing coming along means the devil does it. “Can’t be the Lord working on me.” They’re always searching for some other way to be strong and to get blessed.
They reject the baser flesh—alcoholism and all this kind of stuff—but they live with religious flesh. A lot of preachers are very powerful, effective, big shots, idolized, and they’re just full of flesh—full of flesh just coming out. But people say, “Oh, that’s great. We love it.” The Lord isn’t pleased.
Many people don’t know about this work of the cross. I went halfway around the world one time, and I was speaking in an assembly of charismatics—some couple of hundred people. They asked me to share as I was passing through from this town to that, and I was glad to share. I spoke on the work of the cross.
The people went, “Praise the Lord! Hallelujah! Oh, boy! Oh, yes!” I thought, “Oh, boy, I think I must be off target here. Probably the translator is no good.”
After it was over, the leader of the church said, “I want to have lunch with you tomorrow.” I said, “Oh, there we go. He’s going to kick me out of town or something.”
He came and sat down with me. This guy was a leader and a man of God, and he had this congregation. He said, “My brother, we have all kinds of ministries come through here from the United States. We have never heard this message before. We didn’t know that the Lord works on us like this. Would you please share some more on it?”
That happened to be my second message, if I was allowed to speak it. As I spoke that second time, the people went from absolute silence, and about halfway through some people began to weep.
I spoke about how difficulties come into our lives, and it’s not by chance. It is the Lord bringing us to the end of ourselves and our reliance upon ourselves. Some people came up through a translator and told me afterwards, “You explained what’s been going on in my life. I didn’t understand this until I understood the work of the cross.”
Something so basic, and so many Christians don’t even know it. But to whom much is given, much is required. Now you know it, and it’ll be working in your life, right?
Those who have tried and failed, and known defeat and self-hatred, find the cross to be pretty good news. Because only Christ in you can live the Christian life. You’ve all heard that, but you’re discovering it, you see, at the end of yourself.
He never expected you to defeat sin by striving in your own strength and intentions. He actually had to put up roadblocks in your life to teach you these lessons of the cross: living not by your life, but by His life.
Because of His cross and His work on us, now we are able to pick up our cross and follow Him. We’ve gone through some crisis where the cross brings us to the end of ourselves.
Paul went through that crisis. Hudson Taylor went through that crisis. Billy Graham went through that crisis. It is a crisis of striving and trying and defeat, of quitting, and discovering the life of Christ within. Praise God. And it’s your experience as well.
Before we go any further, I need to clarify two things. First, if you took last night’s message in isolation about the inertia and the going to death of the cross, it’s actually incorrect teaching.
Why do I say that? Because every time you experience death, you experience life. Jesus brings us to death and resurrection. As soon as you go down and die in something, life comes up.
So if you just get the idea that there’s a whole teaching about how you’ve got to die, and you leave it there—“I’m sorry, I’ve got no more message”—then everybody walks around trying to crucify themselves. “Ah, woe is me,” beating yourself on the back.
Every time you die, something comes alive: the real you, the you united with Christ in new living power. So I just want to make that clear.
The death—the “no” side, where the cross says, “No”—happens at the same time as the life that says, “Amen.” In Christ, He is the Amen in your life, but you’ve got to go through the “no” to your self-life to appreciate what that is.
For example, in Galatians 2:20, as soon as Paul came to the revelation and realization that he, in Christ, had been crucified, immediately what did he sense? Death? No. Immediately he sensed the presence of Christ in him, alive.
I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I that live, but Christ liveth in me.
“And now I live.” “I’m so glad I died, because now I live.” So he didn’t go around saying, “Oh, well, Watchman Nee, when he had this experience, he ran up and down the street saying, ‘I’m dead, I’m dead, I’m dead.’”
But he ran up and down the street so fast everybody realized, “He’s alive! He’s alive! He’s alive!” You can’t have the one without the other.
Every time you lay something down that needs to be laid down, and the Lord takes it away, life comes out on the other side, and it’s precious. That’s the whole thing. I didn’t want you to stay in all the misery of last night without realizing that when you die, you live. Right?
The second thing we want to clear up is this: yourself is never eliminated, eradicated, crucified, or annihilated. You can’t annihilate yourself, because yourself is you. Body, soul, and spirit—you are a self. God wants a self.
God doesn’t hate yourself. Actually, yourself was made in the image of God. It’s been marred by sin, but don’t ever think God doesn’t like yourself.
There is a difference between the old man and yourself. The old man used to control yourself. It is not the same thing as the flesh, which needs to be crucified and dealt with, but yourself is not that same thing.
When Paul is going through his woes and uses the pronoun “I” in Romans 7, how many times does Paul say, “I”? “I don’t know what to do. I try to do it. I can’t do good. I do what I can’t do. I’m dead. I’m alive. I’m miserable.” Twenty-seven times.
That is the problem with self-life, you see, until that “I” gets crucified as the center of our life. In the middle of it, Paul says:
For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing.
Nothing—oops—“that is, in my flesh.” Because I know Jesus loves myself. That’s what He’s trying to save: the salvation of the soul. That’s what He’s trying to redeem. Don’t ever think God doesn’t love you.
There are doctrines going around today about the annihilation of the soul, as if suddenly somebody has this crucified-with-Christ experience and says, “Praise God, I have crucified Christ. Nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Jesus is living, and I am now a robot.”
No, you’re still a self. God loves human beings. He wants to use human beings. He wants to put Christ’s life in human beings so human beings can radiate the glory of God. But He has to smash the vessel in order to get the glory out. He loves you.
As an example, Jesus had a self-life. He was a person, you see. Jesus had to deny Himself. What do I mean?
Maybe He was up late, or Peter was burping a lot, or whatever the situation was, and He didn’t get much sleep. Yet at four o’clock in the morning His spirit arose in Him and said, “Awake, awake, and speak to Your Father.”
So He denied His body, which wanted to stay in the rack. Jesus had to do that. What, do you think Jesus was not a human being? “Yes, Father, I am going to the mountain to talk.” No. He had to deny Himself: “Well, maybe I’ll get some sleep tomorrow night,” and go do it.
Sometimes He was helping, preaching, and healing the multitude. His parents did not tell Him, “Now go take a vacation in Florida.” Because of what God had placed upon Him, He couldn’t do that. He had to deny Himself.
Sometimes people spoke against Him. It would have been so easy—Jesus could have squished somebody like a pack of potato chips. But when people said evil things against Him, He did not recoil back like some kind of cobra.
People called Jesus all kinds of crummy names. Do you think Jesus was so self-centered and egomaniacal that when somebody called Him a bad name He was going to lash back at them? No, no, no, no. He denied Himself.
Jesus had a self. He had a lot of thoughts about a lot of things, but He kept them to Himself unless the Father let Him say them. That takes some self-denial.
Imagine being the smartest person in the world and being able to see right through the eyeballs of everybody, right down into their soul, and yet not talk to them about it. “I can see it. Yeah, yeah, you’ve been married five times and are living with a sixth.”
He said that one time to the lady at the well, right? But there were a lot of other ladies who had been married five times, and He didn’t say anything. It takes self-denial. He was His Father’s mouth-servant.
Ourself has been redeemed, cleansed, sanctified, and set free. So in Luke 9, when we have this verse that says, “If any man would come after Me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow Me,” He is not talking about you denying your old self. You have a new self now. You’re redeemed. You’ve been set free. Christ lives in you.
You who have experienced freedom, what are you going to do with your freedom? Are you going to deny yourself or gratify yourself? What’s your choice? Well, you have freedom, see?
Just because you have a self as a Christian now, that self still needs to be disciplined. We need to learn how to walk, and all this kind of stuff involves self-denial.
We now live with a redeemed self. As a new creation in Christ, we still have to die to self on a daily basis. As Paul said, “I die daily.” There are daily disciplines of body, soul, and spirit. There are also daily sacrifices of love, service, and consecration to the Lord.
The cross works in you, in your life every day, and also in the church life and in your ministry. You serve with a redeemed self, but this redeemed self has to learn discipline as well.
You have to learn how to serve the Lord in His life, and it takes some discipline. Especially in the body of Christ, you will find many times that opportunities to minister come when you are tired, upset, or busy. They do not just come when it’s a perfect time and you have nothing else to do.
You have to learn to deny yourself of some things you would have done in order to serve the Lord and His purposes in the body. Our particular calling in the body will involve sacrifice for His sake.
You remember how Paul says in Colossians 1:24, “I do my part to fill up that which is lacking in the body of Christ.” That involved prison for Paul. That involved persecution on Paul’s part, because he was trying to help the Gentile Christians grow from glory to glory.
For that, he had to deny himself, because he faced trouble all along the way because of his service to the Lord.
Here is the long-range view. When we’re talking about denying ourselves daily, basically this is what is going on:
He must increase, but I must decrease.
The more the Lord can empty yourself—what does that mean? Empty yourself of a strong will to become a pliable will. Empty yourself of a mind filled with a lot of stuff, bringing it to the simplicity of Christ.
When He can simplify your emotions so you’re not like a roller coaster, then He can fill you with Himself. You become a stable person.
In Acts 6, when the seven deacons were appointed, they were to be men full of the Holy Spirit. That meant they had some kind of even keel in their life. They had wisdom, grace, and experience.
Their body, soul, mind, emotions, and will were under the control of the Spirit. This is the long-range view of what the Lord does in our lives as this process goes on.
Tonight I’ve just done kind of like a “ten ways” thing, because Jim says you’re all looking for a formula: “Okay, one, two, three, four—what do I do?” So now I’m giving you ten.
These aren’t exhaustive. There are actually twenty-nine—no, I don’t know how many there are. There are all kinds of opportunities for you to deny yourself, but I’m just going to mention ten.
Now that you’re redeemed, yourself is alive in Christ, and you’re going to face some discipline with this new self and new life. Taking up your cross is a free-will choice. Are you going to take it up or not?
All of them involve self-denial. They may seem small, but it’s still there. All of these are pleasing to the Lord.
Learning to live by faith and not feelings. This is a crisis that people go through, because sometimes you get close to the Lord, you feel His presence, and everything is wonderful. Sometimes you don’t feel God so close. You don’t even feel saved, necessarily.
Because of circumstances, you can’t even really say you’re happy. Problems sometimes overwhelm us; our soul can only take so much.
I tell the folks back in Manhattan, “Don’t say that you are overwhelmed. Just admit that you’re whelmed.” Because by the Lord’s grace, you don’t have to be overwhelmed.
Sometimes you just have to say, “I believe; therefore, I’m going to do this. The Lord asked me to do this. I don’t feel anything particularly, but I feel the Lord saying yes, and by faith I’m just going to do it.”
Not just living by your feelings. Don’t say that’s what’s important. Faith. You live by faith, not by sight, right?
When Gideon was asked to go and raise up an army, he laid out fleeces on the ground. He laid out two fleeces, actually, to see if this was really God talking.
In a way, it was a measure of unbelief, but there he was, and he wanted to be sure. He laid out the fleece one night, and the next morning the ground was dry as it ever was, but the fleece was wet.
The second time he did it, the fleece was dry but the ground was wet. By that, Gideon knew that God wanted him to raise up an army. That is what we call laying out a fleece.
“Should I marry that girl? Lay out a fleece.” Don’t do it. “If she turns around and winks, I know I should marry her.” No, don’t do crazy stuff.
But Gideon laid out the fleece, and there is a story behind it. When the fleece was wet and the ground was dry, it meant that he would have an anointing from God and life from God even when things around him were dry.
When you are serving God, sometimes you go among people who are spiritually dry. You need to have some life from the Lord.
Yet the second time, the fleece and the ground were changed around. The wet ground meant that you, as a servant of God, can provide life for others even when you are dry.
Sometimes you go and speak somewhere, and you don’t feel especially loaded up with the Holy Spirit. For whatever reason, you’re going through a dry time. So do you just quit? “Lord, I can’t do it. I’m dry.” The Lord says, “Do it.”
The answer is very simple, isn’t it? You’re either going to do it or not. “Well, I don’t feel like it.” Okay, fine. Do it.
Your feelings are like a wave—up and down, up and down. What, have you got to catch it on the top of the sine curve? It’s ridiculous. We’ve got to learn this lesson, and you learn it many times over.
Especially on Sunday morning. You get up—do you feel like going to worship? “Oh, lay in bed. Oh, what was that I ate last night?” You go anyway, right?
Number two: we have to deny our independent self by yoking up with Jesus. We are newly saved servants of God, but we like to serve alone, like the Lone Ranger. “Hi-yo, Silver!” You hop on the horse.
But real life in churches is different. They say, “Okay, Griselda and Mumford, you guys work together in that kids’ class.” Strange to say, Griselda and Mumford are completely opposites. But God, in His yoke, is making them work together.
“Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me.” We put our head in the yoke, and He pulls most of the load and gently teaches us to serve. That’s what you’ve all heard.
You say, “Oh, I’m yoked up with Jesus. This is such a sweet experience. It’s just me and Jesus yoked up, pulling the plow. He’s doing the work. I’m just sitting here eating daisies. He loves me, He loves me not.”
But the truth of the matter is, often the Lord yokes us with people who aren’t quite so gentle. The same with marriage: you get yoked up.
It is often that we get yoked up with people, and it’s not always quite so easy. Have you ever been yoked up with somebody and asked to minister with them, and they were quite different from you?
The Lord says, “Yeah, but you see, I want to express a diversity by two different people, or three different people, who kind of see things a little differently.” The Lord often chooses opposites just for fun.
You remember in Philippians, Euodia and Syntyche. Euodia means good odor, so I call her Sweetie. Syntyche means good luck, so I call her Lucky. Sweetie and Lucky served in the gospel together, but they weren’t getting along for some reason.
Paul tells the brothers there, “Would you help Sweetie and Lucky get together and work things out?” It’s important. They’re yoked up together. Isn’t it a shame that they’re pulling different ways? No, it can’t be.
They had to deny themselves to be one together and work together.
Number three: denying yourself to maintain the unity of the Spirit. This is from Ephesians 4:3:
Giving diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
We have been made one in the Spirit, but, as you know, it can be a tricky thing to remain one together. Saints have some fights. Saints get their feelings hurt.
Saints need somebody who is a peacekeeper—somebody who, even when they are hurt, does not respond, but rather seeks the unity of the Spirit. That takes some self-denial.
When somebody hurts you, what do you want to do? Hurt them back. No. For the sake of the body of Christ, you deny yourself and maintain this unity of the Spirit that is our possession.
It is more important to keep that unity than to have your say. But it means a lot of times you have to swallow your gum and not say anything.
Don’t forget, this is Jesus’ prayer in John 17:21:
That they may all be one; even as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be in Us: that the world may believe that Thou didst send Me.
The unity of the Spirit has been crushed in the church by divisions. Those who are peacemakers, Jesus calls sons of God, because they are one in a million.
Count Zinzendorf was a German count. In the eighteenth century, born in 1700, when he was twenty years old, he received some three hundred acres of land in Germany.
Because he loved the Lord, people began coming to him saying, “Look, we’re escaping from the Austrian Empire. They are killing everybody who is a Protestant. Because we’re Huguenots, Anabaptists, or Lutherans, we need a place to hide.”
He said, “Hey, I’ve got an idea. Go live on my property and work together.” These were all Christians—Moravians, Czechs, some from Poland, Germans, and French. They all spoke their native language.
They got there and started living together. By 1727, there was such fighting going on in the community. Each of these groups was fighting. They were praying in all their different languages, and they weren’t understanding one another. It got so bad that something had to be done.
All these Christians had come together because they loved the Lord—not nominal Christians—and they were fighting like crazy. What are you going to do?
Count Zinzendorf got up and began to talk to the people. He said, “I know we’ve all been convicted of our sins because we’ve spoken against one another, striven with one another, and disagreed with one another.”
Then he said, “I want to say, I believe it’s my fault. I’m sorry that I haven’t been more of a shepherd to you. I’m sorry that I have been divided myself.” He began to cry.
He got down and washed the feet of three hundred people, asking forgiveness of everybody. That was the day, August 13, 1727, that the Holy Spirit came down and made those three hundred people one body of Christ.
It is called the Moravian Revival. It lasted for a hundred years. They prayed twenty-four-seven for a hundred years, sent out many missionaries, and many wonderful things happened.
But it began when a man laid down his life and washed the feet of all the people. They were so ashamed. The Czechs were not getting along with the Poles—what was the matter with them? They all embraced each other and then washed one another’s feet.
One of the practices in the Moravian churches was foot-washing, which they held once in a while along with a love feast, because that love was so important.
Imagine what would happen if you were such a reconciler, if you were such a peacemaker. Boy, that is needed in the body of Christ.
Number four: deferring personal goals for the Lord’s sake. Deferring means putting off making your million dollars, putting off getting that bigger house, putting off your personal plans to have a ninety-foot yacht that you escape on during the weekends.
The Lord often gathers people together to stand as a testimony and be built up over the years. Then suddenly things such as promotions, demanding jobs, relocations, and changing business plans begin to happen.
The next thing you know, the body of Christ is missing some of the essential core people that God brought together. I am not saying you can’t take a promotion or move to another location.
But I am saying that a top priority in the body of Christ—if you read the Bible, you know it is true—is church life. It is a communal thing. It is a life together.
In Acts 2:42, the key words are “they continued steadfastly.” In other words, they got together as often as they could. So you don’t go and buy a house sixty miles away from where you meet. Think about it.
If you don’t love the Lord, then you want to stay away from everybody and just show up on Sunday. But the church won’t be built that way.
It is a sacrifice to be part of the body of Christ. Communal living means you share your goods, you stay in the vicinity, and maybe you have to rent instead of buy. Sometimes you make decisions like that for the sake of the Lord’s work because you believe the Lord is working.
Everybody scatters to the wind and takes the first promotion. They say, “We’ll give you thirty thousand more a year, but you’ve got to move to Manitoba.” Well, what are you doing? Can anything good come out of Manitoba? Of course it can.
The Lord is sovereign in this. The Lord moves people here and there, and it is His will. But everybody who gets a promotion and automatically thinks it is God’s will may be making a mistake.
It is good, before you get too far along, to think: it is not how much money you are making that determines God’s will. It is whether you are able to meet with the saints on a regular basis, fellowship with them, and live with them.
I’m so happy these folks from Memphis are here because so many of them live right next to each other. They live like a family.
It is not just a church. They are not going to church; they are a church. They are being built together in love. It is a fellowship that involves some deferring of your own personal goals and desires.
Think about it. Are you serving God or Mammon? Why does Jesus ask that question? The biggest idol today—don’t say there are no more idols—is Mammon. Mammon is the biggest idol we have in Western civilization.
Your default mode is what? Accumulate, right? But the accumulator with the most toys loses. I know so many Christians who ended up making a lot of money and gaining a lot of toys, and they lost their marriage along the line.
Mammon is a wicked demon. It’s a wicked demon. Don’t think it’s neutral. Don’t think that ambition to be rich is a neutral thing.
If that gets into your nature, gets into your hide, and gets into your ambition, without denial it will destroy you. It will destroy many good children of God. It already has.
I have many sad tales I could tell of people who started out well and ended up completely destroyed because they went the way of Mammon.
Number five: deny yourself by being willing to be a servant’s servant. In the body of Christ, of course, we all want to be the guy who teaches up in front. But sorry, you’ve got to be over six feet tall. No, no, no—I’m kidding you.
The Lord wants everybody who has a gift and whom He calls to have a chance. But here is the deal: sometimes we think we are ready to teach or lead in the body, or in a group of children, or whatever it may be, but the Lord asks you to serve those who do so.
It irks you a little bit, because when you hear the person who is teaching and you are just their assistant—which means you hold the crayons and sit on a kid who is acting up—you say, “You know what? I could teach better than her with my eyes closed.”
“Lord, why aren’t I teaching this thing? How come it’s her? Why, is it just because she’s older?” We get all this kind of stuff festering around.
But the Lord takes most of His servants and makes them servants’ servants. Joshua was a servant of Moses for years.
When Moses died, God said, “Moses My servant is dead. Now you are Moses’ servant’s servant, and you need to take over.”
One of the best ways we learn to serve is by serving somebody who serves. You see the life of the Lord in them. You see when they say something and when they don’t say something. You see why they say something and why they don’t say something.
You see why they are patient with somebody, and you see why they get after somebody. It is good to be an apprentice.
But it takes some self-denial, because sometimes you think you know better what to do. Peter was often giving Jesus advice. Every time he did, Jesus said, “All right, self, self—down, down, down. Down, Fido.”
Peter learned by watching the Lord. He caught on to a lot of stuff along the way.
Ambition in the body of Christ is a major problem among brothers. I know all the sisters are almost perfect and ready to be raptured, but brothers have a problem with—well, I don’t know—testosterone.
Brothers fight, want to take the first place, want to be ministering, want this and want that, always striving to get into a position. It usually kills the body life.
But those who have been trimmed and trained as servants can be useful to the Lord.
Number six: we sometimes need to deny our personal liberty so that others are not stumbled. In 1 Corinthians 8:13, there were older Christians eating meat that had been offered in the marketplace for idol worshipers.
They said, “That makes no difference. Meat is meat. Those idols are nothing. I can eat anything I want.” Meanwhile, some new Christians who had just been saved had been taught, “Don’t ever go down by that idol temple. Never buy meat from those idol temple worshipers.”
The older Christians said, “Yeah, yeah. Hey, look at my steak. I like mine rare.” And they were stumbling the young Christians.
Paul was saying that if you stumble younger Christians just to exercise your supposed liberty, that is not love; that is pride. And that is wrong, right?
Today we have Christians from New York City who think nothing of drinking. I am not going to say drinking is right or wrong, or one beer is good and two beers are bad, or a glass of wine is behind. I am not going to say anything.
All I am going to say is, it is better not to drink if you are around some people whom you would stumble by doing so. Some Christians like their freedom, and in their freedom they hurt other Christians.
You mean to say you cannot deny yourself a beer so that you can encourage your younger brothers and sisters? Or is it so important to you to have your beer and go out clubbing at night and all this kind of stuff?
That is the kind of stuff that causes cliques in the body of Christ. You are not thinking of your brothers and sisters. You need to deny yourself and go the way of love, not the way of pride.
Sure, you have liberty. Paul says, “I have liberty.” There are a lot of things I can do, but I do not do them because they do not edify. They do not help other people. So I do not do them.
You will have to trace out your own ground in that, but the Lord will have you deny yourself about these things. It is very important for the sake of the body.
Number seven: 2 Timothy 2:21-22. You need to deny self for the sake of holiness, righteousness, and truth.
If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honour, sanctified, meet for the Master’s use, prepared unto every good work.
Flee also youthful lusts: but follow after righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart.
The Lord wants a vessel of honor. Here you are, born-again self, and the Lord is working in your life. Self-denial is very important if you are going to be true to the Lord, especially in an evil age like we are living in now.
You know what is available to you, and you know what kind of self-denial you need to go through to stay away. To remain a virgin, to me, is a wonderful thing. To abstain from wickedness of all kinds.
There are probably some in here who are addicted to pornography—just addicted. It is a shame. It is a shame that you do not know the truth.
We worship a God who creates beautiful women, and all their body parts have a function—a wonderful function. This is God’s wonderful gift. But when we go to the dark side, and start thinking sex is some kind of idolatry, it gets into your bones to the place where you cannot relate to somebody normally anymore.
It is a great, great problem in this day. To be a vessel of honor, you need to pursue righteousness and holiness with those who call on the Lord. You need to get together and encourage one another in these things. It is very difficult.
There is a book called The Lord of the Ring. No, this isn’t Tolkien. It was written by a man named Phil Anderson, and it is about the Moravians and Count Zinzendorf.
When the church had gotten started, Zinzendorf went around among other counts in Poland and Germany. Those who were truly Christians and wanted to live a holy life had a secret society, and they wore a ring.
The ring said, “By the Lamb, we conquer.” They wore that ring as a pledge to one another that they were going to live holy, moral Christian lives.
I am not saying you need to go out and get a ring. But I am saying you need to encourage one another in holy living. Help one another. When somebody falls down, pick them back up and help.
Even as a teenager, you need to have a good friend who is also a Christian—someone you can tell the truth about what is going on with you and pray together about these issues and things that come up in our lives.
Without self-denial, the world has so many tempting things going on that you will fall right into it. You really need brothers and sisters and self-denial.
These seven opportunities for self-denial are done because you love the Lord. Remember two things: you must deny yourself before you can carry any specific cross the Lord gives you.
The Lord says, “Now, for My sake, I want you not to buy that house yet. Just hold off.” You have to deny yourself in that, and you have to choose it by your own free will.
Sure, go ahead and do whatever you want. But that will not lead you into the purpose of God.
These sacrifices are many times giving up good things. Sometimes we have to give up comfort for the sake of the Lord. Sometimes we give up that new house. Sometimes we give up prosperity. Sometimes we defer a promotion up the ladder.
Sometimes it involves cutting back on our sports mania. Sometimes it gets right into our own personal rights. “I have a right to do that.” The Lord says, “Yes, you do, but I’m asking you not to do it.”
These are not bad things, but they are things that the Lord will ask us, at various times, to deny for His sake.
There would not be a missionary out in the world if there were not some people willing to lay it down and give up a house, money, and a future. There are all kinds of things like that.
These sacrifices of self are out of devotion to your Master. Do not deny yourself if you do not love the Lord.
Many self-centered Christians do not believe God would ask us to sacrifice. “What? God wants me to prosper and be blessed.” Well, He does, but He also asks you to sacrifice.
“Give up my safety? What?” A dear sister of ours in Manhattan just went and held a nurses’ teaching conference out in Africa. She got back, and I saw her on the West Coast. I said, “How’d it go?” She said, “Man, it’s scary things happening out there.” Let the Lord protect her.
What—give up money? Give up a bigger house? Give up recreation? Entertainment? Give up creature comfort? Forsake the avoidance of pain?
“That’s the one goal of my life. I don’t want any pain. Please, just no pain.” You have to contract that dentist out—you know, the painless dentist guy—and he will anesthetize you any time anything happens, because you just do not want to endure pain.
Pain is a real grower. We really grow sometimes when we have growing pains, right?
“What? Give up on marriage?” Many times the Lord does not say, “Give up on it.” He just says, “That’s not the right person.”
The last three self-denials are beyond where most of us are at. These are people who have denied themselves because they have seen higher stakes, higher ground, and God’s purpose. Their sacrifice is greater, but their blessings are also greater.
The Lord asks us sometimes, as we are walking with Him—and this is a grown-up thing—“Do you love Me?” Like Peter, you put your foot in your mouth and say, “Yes, Lord, I love You.” Now you are caught.
Then He asks you to sacrifice something—something of yourself—for His sake. This is the highest sacrifice, the most costly, and the most precious.
Those people who are willing to sacrifice because they love the Lord and are captured by the Lord, those are the people whose lives are fulfilled and full of joy and peace. They are no longer worrying or insecure, because the Lord has taken care of them as they have taken care of the Lord.
In the Bible, many people had to sacrifice themselves and deny themselves to do God’s purpose. Abraham led a life of sojourning and self-sacrifice.
What did he discover? He discovered God, God, God everywhere he went. If you discover God, you have gained your inheritance, even if you do not have any land.
Think of Hannah giving up her little boy Samuel when he was just a little boy. Boy, talk about self-denial. But she did it. It was the right thing to do.
Esther, for the sake of her people, said, “If I perish, I perish.” “I’m willing to stake my life for the will of God.”
Moses was living for himself there on the mountain, and at eighty years old God called him and said, “Go back there to Egypt and get My children. Your life is not about you anymore. It is about the people of God.”
Are you willing to serve God’s people? Paul, coming ashore after his shipwreck on his way to Rome—his whole life was laid down for the Lord. And of course the Lord Himself—what a sacrifice He made for us.
Every time we deny ourselves, we are actually looking like the Lord, because He was first and foremost in all matters of denial.
To stand for the Lord’s testimony means that sometimes you have to stand against family, friends, and coworkers. If you receive a real vision of God’s church and God’s purpose in Christ, there is a price that goes with it.
Many people do not see that, do not understand what you are doing, and end up standing against you. Zinzendorf, John Wesley, Martin Luther, J. N. Darby—all these people saw something from the Lord, and immediately other Christians around them blackballed them.
There is a cost to seeing the Lord’s will. John was sent to Patmos for the testimony of the Lord. John Hus was burned at the stake because he translated the Bible into Czech and believed in the gospel.
There was a man in India named Bakht Singh. He was a famous Baptist evangelist, and then he saw the church. All the churches abandoned him, and he had to start building churches according to God’s vision.
There was Brother Nee, who was a successful evangelist and young man. But when he saw the church, all the denominational churches around him began to reject him. They did not understand him. He paid a price.
Stephen Kaung came and lived in Richmond, Virginia. At the time, there were hardly two Chinese people there, apart from those running the local Chinese restaurant.
Why would he move to Richmond? There were many Chinese people emigrating to the United States, Chinese Bible student fellowships in colleges and universities, and all kinds of opportunities for ministry. But he did not go to them.
The Chinese people said, “What are you doing? Why don’t you come and talk to us? You speak our language. You know the Bible. We want you to speak so badly.” And he laid it all down.
Why? Because he saw God wanted a church in the United States. It was not a Chinese church. He sacrificed his reputation, fame, money, and everything. He began going around and preaching to Americans who did not know Chinese and did not know Watchman Nee.
He showed them the way of the church. He sacrificed his whole life. Others got rich and built empires on the West Coast and the East Coast by running around among Chinese churches.
But the Lord does not want a Chinese church in the United States or Canada. He wants all the Chinese people He can save, but He wants a church that stands on the ground of the place where they live.
What a price is paid for that. But when you have seen such a vision, you cannot go back. Because of that, our brother is doubly blessed.
Number nine: God takes some people and flings them out—His devoted servants—into a life of sacrificial work. He still sends out missionaries. He sends people out and even moves them through their jobs to somewhere else.
But while they are there, they do not just do their job. They build the church. They preach the gospel.
C. T. Studd was a famous preacher who went out from England. He was the world’s most famous cricketer. He left it all, and all of his wealth, to go to China, then India, and finally Africa, just to preach the gospel.
Here is what he said:
Some want to live within the sound of church and chapel bell;
I want to run a rescue shop within a yard of hell.
When he launched his missionary organization, he said:
If Jesus Christ is God and died for me, no sacrifice can be too great for me to make for Him.
Isn’t that wonderful? He lived out of that sacrifice, and out of that there was a great revival in the Congo as a result of his ministry in the darkest of Africa.
He died there in the Congo, happy to be serving Jesus, without a penny to his name. He was so happy. So happy.
Number ten: God mysteriously breaks a vessel by a life of suffering so that His grace and glory can be revealed.
Think of the story of Amy Carmichael. You have heard Jim mention one of her books, and her life of suffering. Saint Teresa, the famous mystic, said, “My Father sends the heaviest trials to those He loves the most.”
You cannot explain the story of Job, Jacob, Joseph, or any of these things except by saying that the Lord broke a vessel so that the glory of His will and purpose could come out.
Christian history is full of people who were broken vessels, and the glory came out. They were broken through all kinds of things: setbacks in their health, unexpected career reversals, losing everything, tragic loss of a loved one, catastrophe, plans for marriage and a life that never came to pass.
They faithfully served many years and were betrayed by the people they served. The exposure of sin in the midst was devastating to everybody. Deliberate persecution by outsiders came to these servants.
There are so many things that happen to God’s servants. Sometimes, as Paul simply explains, God has a treasure in an earthen vessel, and God has to break the vessel for the treasure to come out.
The strange thing is that the earthen vessel must be broken for His glory to be displayed.
Now, having seen these senior-grade people who have really paid a price, let’s get back to something very simple.
The sacrificial life of the cross means that you deny yourself. You do not volunteer when you will sacrifice, or the way, or how much, or how long. You do not get to say that.
You get to say, “Yes, Lord,” whatever He asks you to do. We willingly accept the cross from Him when asked, whatever the specifics might be.
Are you willing to sacrifice your life? This is a real question. The Lord might want you to go out to some far-flung place.
I know a lady who was in California as an illegal alien from Mexico. She got saved, went back to Mexico, and now she is a lone missionary in her hometown church. Wonderful lady—laid down her life.
Are you willing to sacrifice for the Lord if He calls you? That in itself is a sacrifice. Truly, if you are willing, it is already a sacrifice.
Here is the deal: just live for Him today in free surrender. That is all He asks of you. He is not asking you to go out somewhere. He says, “Will you follow Me?” You say, “Yes, Lord.”
Then live in the freedom of knowing that you are His willing servant. This is a wonderful thing.
What do we gain? Jesus said:
There is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or mother, or father, or children, or lands, for My sake, and for the gospel’s sake, but he shall receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions; and in the world to come eternal life.
You will have a hundred times what you could have if you live for yourself, by laying yourself down and giving up things to serve the Lord. Of course, you may not own the houses, but you will stay in people’s houses. Still, you have a large family, you have to admit.
Plus persecution. And in the age to come, eternal life.
Jesus did not say this in exactly these words, but it is the absolute truth: if you lay down your life for the sake of the Lord, you get the liberating joys of love’s intimacy with Jesus, revelations, glories, and power entrusted in your hands as a bondservant.
It is a wonderful thing when you serve the Lord. He will not be your debtor, believe me. He will give you riches in spiritual matters and in intimacy with Himself. That is precious treasure.
What does He gain? If you deny yourself, does He really need you to sacrifice? Is He like one of those nasty gods up in the clouds saying, “I want another bowl. One more bowl. Sacrifice another virgin to King Kong”?
What does God get out of it? Does He want sacrifice? Here is what He gets in the whole thing: when you are a servant, deny yourself, and daily come and serve the Lord, here is what the Lord gets: a friend.
Jesus still needs another friend. Many people call out to Him and ask Him for a whole bunch of stuff. But how many people sit down and say, “Jesus, I just want to talk to You today”?
“Just want to say how much I enjoyed the beautiful weather here in Ancaster this week. You’re a wonderful Guy.” He loves it when there is a friendly conversation without strings attached.
“And, oh, by the way, would You give me a million dollars?” Jesus says, “I knew it.”
What does He gain? He gains a vessel of honor that does not complain about its sacrifice. “Oh, look at me. I’m sacrificing for the Lord. I’m going through such a tough time, sacrificing for the Lord.”
The Lord says, “No, no. You are no longer a sacrifice for Me if you start bellyaching and telling everybody you are a sacrifice. You are no longer a sacrifice.” That is tricky.
He gains a broken vessel whose loving sacrifice has a sweet aroma. Paul says we exude the aroma of Christ in every place.
He gains a testimony on earth that God is loved for who He is and not just for what He gives. Are you something like that? Do you love God just for who He is, aside from what He gives?
I know you keep saying, “He forgave me. He saved me.” He has given us a lot. Now, have you seen enough of the Lord to love Him for just who He is?
I am not only a dad; I am a granddad, and I love having kids. I know the kids love me, and I love them. But it hurts a little bit when they say, “Daddy, Daddy, I love you. Can I have another ice cream?”
How about just, “Daddy, Daddy, I love you.” End of sentence.
God gains a vessel He can use to serve in the larger arena of His eternal purpose.
Brothers and sisters, thank you so much for listening. Let’s have a prayer before we end this meeting.
We are so glad we are alive in Christ. You blessed us. You keep us in the grace room, and by faith in the Holy Spirit You keep blessing us in so many ways.
We know that You are after some important things. You want to see the body built up and become the bride. You want Jesus to come back. So there is a necessary service to be carried on at this present time. It takes some self-denial.
Lord, we want to stand up and be counted. We know we are unworthy. We know we are just an earthen vessel. But, Lord, we are so thankful that before You come back, You give us the privilege to work in Your fields.
Help us learn to deny ourselves in the body, to put on a yoke with another brother or another sister, learn all these kinds of lessons, and fall more deeply in love with You.
May we be ready to make whatever sacrifice—even the sacrifice of our life, if it comes to it—because we love You so; not out of obligation, but because we love You so.
Do seal our hearts with love for You. Do make us worshipers of the Lamb. Whatever You call us to do—probably some small thing—give us grace to recognize there is a call for self-denial and to be willing to take up our cross to be faithful to You.
These things we pray in Jesus’ precious name. Amen.